The New Return
by refinedbeauty
Summary: It's twenty years in the future. Todd is satisfied working on the farm, Viola works as a politician. They have two children: Valentine, 14, and Trenton, a happy 10 year old. But this happy little life is about to end with the sudden disappearance of the Spackle. What happened to them, and what will happen to New World? Feed back is appreciated. Help me be a better writer :)
1. A New Day

**Valentine:**

The sun shines brightly through the window. I pull the covers around me. The warm blankets act as a membrane, protecting me from the mild chill in the air on this crisp autumn morning. But in truth, I really don't want to wake up.

I don't want to go out today. I just want to lay here and sleep. But, still, the world can't go on without me.

I swing my legs out, momentarily getting tangled in the covers. I take a moment as the cold air suddenly hits me. Then, I get up and get dressed.

Dad gave me the job of taking care of our small flock of sheep, saying it was his job a long time ago, practically on a different world, ante bellum, when Cillian was still alive.

Cillian. Dad talks, and thinks, a lot. About how he was a great, great man, who loved him, no matter what, even dying so Dad could live.

I'm walking down the path now, the one I've walked many a day, since I could tottle, I suppose. I hear barking behind me. _**Wait, Valentine, sheep, Valentine! **_I slow down for Maskee to catch up.

**Todd**

I watch her from the kitchen window. My daughter. _My _daughter. I still can't believe it. It's been fourteen years, and I still can't believe it.

She looks so much like her mother.

_**Viola.**_

__"Dad?" I turn and see little Trenton come in the room. He isn't so little anymore, but he'll always be little Trent to me. He's not yet ten, but I s'pose he looks like me. At least, that's what Viola says.

_**Viola.**_

But he should be at school.

"I would," he says, already hearing the question in my noise. "But I can't find my boots." Sure enough, he don't got any boots on his feet.

"I put 'em in the closet, where they're supposed to be. Go get 'em on, and I'll drive you to school."


	2. The Reveal and Reflection

**Valentine**

Maskee is running about the sheep. I can hear him, _**Sheep! Smells, Valentine! Sheep! **_And the sheep say back, _**Dog, dog, wolf, dog, safe, sheep, sheep, sheep….**_They don't think much.

Maskee's noise changes. _**Ryan, Valentine! Ryan is here! Treat?**_

And, surely enough, he is leaning on the fence, watching me, Bradley's son, who oddly likes to watch me tend the stupid sheep. He's two years older than me, but we were raised like siblings, and I was always in his classes at school, not because he wasn't smart, but more like Mom just couldn't stand me being at grade level. I'd still be in school, if I hadn't moved at my own pace.

He's also not _un_attractive.

"Hello, stranger," he says, swiftly swinging his long legs over the fence. "Here ya go, Maskee," he directs to the dog, opening his hand to give him the customary treat."

"What are you doing here?" I ask, a little sourly, unintentionally. I kick a sheep of my boot.

"I have a proposition for you."

**Viola**

Stress. It's my life now. I should have never agreed to this job, but what the people want, the people want. I sigh as I straighten the papers on my desk, adjusting the pictures of Trenton, Valentine, and Todd.

Todd. I wonder what he is doing right now. I miss him every day, when we part ways in the morning. But, he is happier on the farm, away from the noise and reminders of the Mayor. He is quite satisfied with the company of the animals, especially Angharrad.

I shake myself and get back to work. It's just that what I do is, just, less my cup of tea than, say, healing. I have to talk to people all day, all day I have to put on a smile and be firm.

But I hate telling people no. I hate telling them their ideas are stupid, that they'll never work, that I won't take them before the committee.

Bradley suggested it to me. No, he nominated me. He more or less got me elected before I even knew I was nominated. But, that's just Bradley. He knew if he told me I would back out, and he believed me the most qualified for the job.

Well, I guess he was right, because here I am, 20 years later, doing the same thing.

There's a knock at the heavy oak doors of my office. "Come in," say, standing. I have a hunch who it.

President Jones comes in. "After noon, Mrs. Hewitt."

"Please, sit, sir." The president comes to my office every once in a while to talk to me, not necessarily about politics, though. He wants to learn about the war, about being awake on the journey here. He wants to learn what it was like to be a major character in the tragedy of the Mayor's downfall. "What do you want to talk about today?"

"I've been thinking," he looks at his hands folded in his lap, then turns his head up to look at me, the light reflecting off of his glasses, like headlights on a fission car. "Tell me, Viola, when was the last time you saw a Spackle?"

**Trenton**

I love Dad. My friends talk about how much they hate their dads, how they are annoying, but I don't get that. I love my Dad.

I love Mom, too. I love her a lot. I guess Valentine loves Mom, too, even though they fight a lot.

And I guess I love Valentine, too. But I would never, ever, ever tell…ever.

But Dad and I are in the fission car, and he is driving me to school. I can hear him thinking about Grandpa and Cillian.

I've never met Cillian, but I s'pose I'd love him, too, if I met him.


	3. Crumpled

**Viola**

I knock gingerly on the door. It's more a courtesy, since I know that Ben knows I'm already here. The door creaks open, spooky like. It hadn't even been closed properly. "Ben? Ben, are you there?" Concern is creeping into my voice. All the unbearable thoughts are racing through my head. Ben, though very open, likes his security. The door, though hardly ever locked, is always firmly shut.

I walk across the threshold and into the quaint living room to the right. "Ben?" He's not down stairs. My heart pounds in my rib cage. This isn't good. I race upstairs, going straight to his bedroom, though I know it isn't like him to still be in bed, or take naps, for that matter.

I stop. I listen. There it is, the small, faint voice, being carried to me via the breeze coming from the ceiling fan. "Ben!" I run around the bed to where I hear the faint whisper coming from. Seeing what I see, I stop dead in my tracks. "Oh, Ben! What has happened to you?"

**Valentine**

"I'm not doing anything illegal."

"Well, you're no fun." He's giving me the puppy dog face. Gosh, he's good. His deep, brown eyes just melt me from the inside out. It's incinerating to say no. It's a death wish. You'll die of guilt.

I give a deep, deliberate sigh. "Fine, tell me, and I'll use my discretion."

His face becomes animated. "We should go camping, in the woods just outside town. It'll just be me, you, and Maskee."

Maskee barks at his name. _**Maskee, fun, tree! **_

**Trenton**

Bradley. Uncle Bradley is a lot of fun. I sometimes go over to his house to hang out with Ryan. Ryan doesn't play. He says that "gentlemen" his age don't play, and that boys my age shouldn't either. I don't get that. Anyway, Bradley tells me stories about living on a spaceship, and how he taught Mom everything she knows about numbers and spelling and grammar. He says he taught all the children on the ship, those who were old enough to learn, that is.

I wish I had been there. I wish I had been there about a million years ago when that ship landed. Be one of the first to come off and step foot on grass for the first time. Or in the war, alongside Dad when he was a kid.

But my life is good, too. I have Uncle Bradley, Grandpa Ben, Mom, and Dad to tell me about living then, but I think I like living now.


	4. Agony of Guilt

**Viola**

"Ben!" I run to his side. He is lying in the fetal position, and his skin is the color of snow. His clothes are disheveled and soiled, and his hair is greasy and askew. It is obvious he has been laying here for quite some time, and no one noticed. "Oh, Ben."

I help him sit up, then get to his weak legs. He is leaning hard on me, I know he is very weak. _**Thank you.**_ I barely hear it. I get him into the hallway, then realize I have to get him down the stairs without breaking our necks.

After minutes that seem like hours, I get him down the steps and into my fission car parked out front. He settles in, then directs his noise at me, _**shaving kit. **_I laugh. Of all the things, but I go back in and grab his shaving kit and throw a few shirts, underwear, and a pair of pants into a small bag. Then I go back outside and get in the fission car.

**Todd**

I hear the fission car coming down the drive way. Is it five o'clock already? I haven't even started dinner yet! I walk around the corner of the house and see Viola get out of the car and walk around to the passenger side. She sees me and motions me over. "Come help me, sweetie."

I obey, not knowing what in the world she could need help with. Then, I see him through the wind shield. I run over, not knowing what was wrong with him. He should be able to get out of a fission car by himself. "Ben!" I start running.

**Valentine**

We are riding into the woods. I'm riding Angel, a beautiful mare Dad gave me when I was ten. It was the last of Angharrad's foals. I feel guilty. I told Dad I was going to go camping with Mary Anne, a girl from school. Ryan is riding next to me, humming a tune that would annoy me coming from anyone else but him. His voice is deep and rich, even with his mouth closed.

I don't even know what he had planned. When he asked me, or more told me we were going camping, it seems as though he was going to say something, but changed him mind and conjured this idea on the spot.

I wonder what's going on in that brain of his.


	5. Words from the Soul

**Ryan**

Valentine thinks I'm setting up the tent, but I'm really watching her make the fire. Her face is wrinkled in concentration, her long, strawberry blond hair pulled back. She amazes me. She amazes me in the way every part of her is a small detail, the way her nose wrinkles when she laughs, the way she talks with her eyes. I can tell what she's thinking, even though she doesn't have noise like the guys.

I think about what I'm going to ask her. I know she's old enough to handle it, but she's still two years younger than me. But she's always been my peer. I've always tried to impress her. I don't know if she realizes this.

I hope she says yes.

**Viola**

We get Ben in the guest room, and I leave to make some tea while Todd gets him into clean clothing. I think, maybe I'll make him a cheese sandwich, since who knows the last time he ate something. I know I wouldn't just want tea if I were him.

I assemble a tray as the water is boiling. Todd comes in and leans against the door way. He is watching me, I know it. He hasn't taken his eyes off of me since he woke up in the Spackle camp, so many years ago.

I pour the tea into a mug and walk out of the kitchen, Todd getting out of the way for me, then following me down the hallway to the guest room.

**Todd**

Viola sets the tray on Ben's lap. He shakily picks up the sandwich. We let him eat for a while, and then Viola asks, "So, what happened? Why were you like that?"

"It's the Spackle." His actual voice says, though it is scratchy, since he rarely communicates that way. "They are weak. I am weak. They are all together on the other side of the planet. They are weak."

His eyes start drooping. He is tired. "We'll let you get some rest," Viola says, seeing what I'm seeing. "Come on, Todd, let's go get dinner started. We'll come get you in an hour or so, so you can eat with us if you want."

She walks out of the room, looking over her shoulder to make sure I follow her out.


	6. Truly Young

**Trenton**

I know he's not much, but he's mine. He's my first horse. Dad calls him a pony, but I know he prefers to be called a horse, he's told me. I named him Ricky, years ago, but he decided his name was Steve about the same time he decided he was a horse. _**Ricky's a pony name, **_he told me.

Dad told me that you can tell a good man from his horse. He kept Angharrad nicely, and even now, with her ankles swollen with arthritis, grazing in the sunny fields most days, she still greets him happily. Dad has me take care of Steve, brushing out his mane daily, cleaning his tack, and doing exercises with him most days.

I tack him up, getting him ready to go for a ride. He doesn't seem quite excited, much rathering his toasty, straw filled stall to the sharp, early fall night, but he doesn't do much but complain. I mount without a mounting block, something I've just recently accomplished. I direct him towards the wooded path, mapping in my head just where we're going to go.

I think I'll take the outside loop, since it's hardly five.

**Valentine**

Ryan comes and sits next to me around the fire. I'm quite proud of it. It's roaring and spreading warmth around the clearing, stretching shadows and giving everything an orange glow. It's quite cozy, and makes you want to get closer to the people around you. Lucky for me, my company doesn't appear to have a bubble. He just gets closer and closer.

I can hear him thinking my name. I can see what he's planning, but vaguely. It has something to do with me. Well, of course it does, why else would I be here.

Understood, crisp silence creeps between us. He finally breaks it. "Valentine, I've been thinking. You and I, we've been raised as brother and sister. But, I don't want to continue that way. We've watched each other grow up. I've seen you as girl, and I've seen you now as a woman. I was wondering if, maybe,"

I can't help myself. I guffaw. "Did you rehearse that!"

His face turns red. "Yah, kind of. It was good, though, right?"

"Totally convincing. And my answer is yes. We can date. If you can stand the my awesome personality."

"Oh, I don't think that will be a problem. I hope your cool with being out shined by my awesome skills."

We kiss. It's not much more than a, well, I it's not important. It's interrupted anyway, when we hear a little gasp from the edge of the clearing.


End file.
